Superlative care of staff who saved my baby’s life

Eleven years ago, soon after my waters broke, my husband and I arrived at the
private Lindo wing at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, west London, and
were whisked immediately up to the fifth floor.

Press outside The Lindo Wing of St Mary's HospitalPhoto: GETTY

By Anna Maxted

6:10AM BST 23 Jul 2013

Once we’d entered through the electronically locked and monitored door, we were ushered to a spartan room where I was wired up to monitors to track my blood pressure and the baby’s heartbeat.

After two hours of contractions, I noticed the beeping had slowed. My husband summoned the midwife. She arrived instantly, checked the monitor, and calmly announced: ''This baby needs to be out – now.” My obstetrician appeared like a genie and I had an emergency Caesarean 30 minutes later.

It turned out that the umbilical cord was twice wrapped around my baby’s neck, strangling him. I believe the staff of the Lindo wing saved my son Oscar’s life. I had my two subsequent children, Conrad and Caspar, there and, despite the eye-watering cumulative cost of £30,000 (inclusive of obstetrician, anaesthetist and paediatrician fees) it was worth it. Now the Duchess of Cambridge is experiencing the same superlative level of care.

Yesterday I was back at the Lindo wing, jostling with police and media representatives from around the globe: hundreds of reporters and photographers were inside a makeshift pen where a silver forest of ladders guaranteed every camera a shot of the new parents who would emerge on the steps to show their newborn, just as Diana, Princess of Wales, did with Prince William 31 years ago. Some camera crews were already thinking ahead. A sign reads: ''Post-partum ladder sale (photographer not included)”.

John Loughrey, 58, an ardent royalist, had been sleeping on a bench outside the Lindo wing for the past seven nights: he had a tan and a sore back but yesterday, wrapped in the Union flag, he was preparing to celebrate. Before dawn, Mr Loughrey had been rudely woken by thunder and lightning.

''The heavens came down,’’ he said. ''What a way to wake! And I had the gut feeling that the Duchess had arrived at the hospital.’’

She had indeed. It was thrilling to feel part of this happy occasion – even if most of the celebrants were journalists. ''We don’t have a Royal family, and we admire the tradition,’’ Marcela Skabova, 30, of TV Nova in the Czech Republic told me. ''It’s a fairytale, and everybody wishes the baby is, number one, healthy.”

But, joyous though the atmosphere was outside St Mary’s, there is a sweet sensibility from most well-wishers, that for two young people inside the hospital, this was also an anxious time. Mr Loughrey, a former chef from Wandsworth, south-west London, confessed he was ''spinning like a washing machine”: he would only truly relax when “a healthy mother and healthy baby” were confirmed.

Lorie Adams, 65, from Oklahoma City was on holiday with her daughter, Nichelle, from Dallas, Texas, and was jubilant to be in London “at the right time”. “It’s history – and we’re hoping for a girl,” she said. “I think they’ll be wonderful parents. Very involved. My advice to Kate would be: spend as much time with your baby as possible.’’

Lloyd George Reid, 64, is an ex-Merchant Navy man, who lived locally and was relaxing on a bench, watching the crowds. “This truly generates unity and I’m so glad to be here,” he added.

It’s true. There is a respectful sense here that, foremost, this is a private, family event. And yet – as almost every new parent comes to realise – to an extent, a new baby belongs to everyone who cares about you. England expected, and was rewarded.